


Faith

by PlotWitch



Category: Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter - Laurell K. Hamilton
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-01-28
Updated: 2004-01-28
Packaged: 2019-03-15 19:04:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13619748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PlotWitch/pseuds/PlotWitch
Summary: Faith is a complicated thing, and something that Edward hasn't had in a very long time, not until he met Anita. Now she was slipping away, and he only had his scattered faith to cling to while he tried to save her.





	Faith

Faith.

Such a simple word. And so complicated at the same time. So many meanings.

He looked at the rosary in his hands. He’d taken it from his house on a whim before he’d flown to St. Louis. An ancient relic from his youth, long past and forgotten.

He hadn’t had faith in a long time.

She had given him faith. Which was now dying. A phone call in the middle of the night, the heart of darkest, shattering the peace of the longest and loneliest hours, was killing him.

The detective—Ronnie. She’d called and tried to explain what had happened. She hadn’t done a very good job. She’d been crying too badly.

He’d spent over three thousand dollars using the plane’s phone to speak to his contacts in St. Louis to try and confirm what had happened. Hell, just to even see if he’d been right. And going on the few choking sentences he’d gotten a good idea of what had happened. A very good idea.

Jean-Claude and Richard had made a bid for power and for freedom from Anita. All of it at her expense.

Looking at her now, so still and so pale, he couldn’t understand why anyone could do that. Why would someone want to take that from her? Her life, her vibrancy.

But they had.

He’d just established and confirmed it, through himself and the witch with RPIT. They’d drained her power before breaking the marks. She still had some, but it was barely enough to keep her alive. 

Maybe if he’d told her what he knew, taught her some of the only magic he understood, she’d be fine right now. Shielding and hiding. But that wasn’t her style, she was a fighter, not someone who could hide and live. She could never do that; she could never abide anything that resembled cowardice in her eyes.

And that would.

So he had said nothing and kept his secrets from her. He had been the one hiding, from her and from himself. Making comments and sarcastic remarks about her powers and the monstrosity she could show, when he was hiding his own demons.

His own magic.

 

It was almost too much to think about, too complicated to sit there calmly next to her bed. She was dying and he could have prevented it, could have kept her alive and, if not well, alive…

But he’d kept his secrets. He had to. What would happen if anyone knew? He was a killer, a murderer of monsters, and yet one himself. Anita complained about being one, but at least she was honest.

He hid. From the world. From her. From himself.

He slid a slender dagger from the sheath tucked into his boot and contemplated the cold bright edge for a long moment. It was made of silver and had yet to be christened by blood. Deadly in the harshness of the florescent lighting.

Almost the complete opposite of what his rosary stood for. Killing versus life everlasting. Both required faith, but in a completely different light.

One, the light of faith in oneself, surety in one’s own abilities. The other, faith in something unseen and unknown. And unproven to him.

He preferred to place his faith in something he knew as intimately as his own body.

The dagger had never felt blood, nor anything else. Its first use was a gentle and silent slipping of blade between rosary beads. Softly slithering through cotton thread, the binding of them.

The sound was deafening in the silence of the hospital rooms, the clatter and crash of the beads that struck the ground between his feet. One by one hitting the floor and rolling away into shadow, all but one.

A bead for a Hail Mary.

His voice was soft. “Hail Mary, full of grace.” And a pained look in the silence as he dropped the remains of the rosary to the floor.

He shoved the dagger angrily into the sheath and stood, grinding the bead into the tiled floor. A step forward and he brushed the dark curls from Anita’s pale face, leaning over to press his lips to hers.

Stepping away to the door, a final glance back at her. And the powder from the crushed bead.

“Pray for us. Pray for me.”

 

The pieces were easily collected from various points around the city, hidden months and years in advance in the hope that he’d be able to use it. A barrel, stock, trigger construct. A scope that would function up to two miles away, a magazine.

A magazine with very special bullets, a new home made recipe designed to take down powerful vampires and werewolves in one shot, provided they didn’t miss.

He wouldn’t miss.

He couldn’t miss—it was Anita’s last chance. They had drained her, yes, but there was still some power there. Still some spark that kept her alive.

As long as it was there, if Jean-Claude and Richard were killed, the power they had stolen would rebound back into her body. Of course, there was a chance that the amount of power that would flood her body would kill her.

But he didn’t think it was too likely. She was too strong, too stubborn.

All he had to do was to get rid of them, a fairly simple task with the rifle he carried with him. The hard part would be getting the two of them before the one that remained went to ground. But he thought he had that one covered.

Jean-Claude would be the first target though he wasn’t more powerful. Or rather, Edward didn’t know and didn’t care. Jean-Claude was the logical pick for first kill. He didn’t have anything to truly hide like Richard did.

Richard, on the other hand, had to teach class in the morning and wouldn’t fail to show there. He was altruistic. He wouldn’t think that Jean-Claude’s death was connected to him. He would think it was to throw the Mastership of the city open.

When in reality it was a premonition of his death.

Edward didn’t really want to kill Richard in front of a bunch of junior high kids, but he wasn’t seeing any other choice. If he waited till after school, there was a chance that someone would inform him how Jean-Claude was killed which might accidentally tip him off.

More likely his wolves would decide to play bodyguard and might sniff him out.

So he would hit Richard early in the morning as he showed up at school. He always got there by six. The school was less than two miles from the Circus and an easy way to get both of them.

Jean-Claude would be taken out as soon as he returned to the Circus. Within an hour Richard would recover from the power that recoiled into him and head for the school. Edward would take the shot and then it would be over.

Almost.

He’d still have to head for the hospital and trust in Anita to live.

He still had to have faith in her.

 

He was in the first firing position and waited as patiently as he could for the vampire and his entourage to return. He was two blocks away on the roof of a nightclub. The music inside was still going strong and the harsh thump of the base would cover any noise from the rifle.

He had been waiting for three hours, setting up and checking his equipment repeatedly. There could be no mistake, or the cost would be his life, as well as Anita’s. Not that his life mattered when it came to hers.

He was just a hired gun. She was… She wasn’t like him. She was someone. She was a good person, however misguided and uncertain of her faith. She still believed, and that was more than he did.

So it was easy, very easy, to pull the trigger when the time came. The car pulled up. A nondescript late model sedan, and a slim figure dressed in red and black stepped out. Sapphire eyes glanced about before Jean-Claude took a single step towards his lair.

But it was already too late. The trigger had been pulled and the bullet sank into the flesh between, creating a perfect smoking circle in the vampire’s forehead. The smoking stopped as his head exploded, drenching those nearest him with fragments of gray brain matter and bright red blood.

The vampire had fed well that night, Edward thought as he watched the scene through his scope. Blood was pouring from the ragged remains of the vampire’s neck, steaming in the chill morning air.

Jean-Claude’s body had fallen across the hood of the sedan and it seemed to him that the blood was flowing from the stump, perhaps from the stomach that rejected it with no need to support life. Or a semblance of it.

Edward watched for a few more minutes to make sure that the body would not rise again and then smiled to himself. Mission one—accomplished. He shouldered the rifle and headed for the fire escape.

He wasn’t even on the roof when one of the blood-drenched bodyguards turned his head to stare where Edward had knelt so shortly before. Another set of blue eyes flickered as nostrils flared.

The scent was unmistakable to the werewolf in the morning air. The hunt was on. Only now, the tables were turned, and hunter had become prey.

 

He was huddled on top of the school, the only decent place to take a shot for half a mile. Most of the area around the school was residential and Edward didn’t want to try climbing a roof only to be shot down by a responsible homeowner.

He was positioned above a wing of the school that ran parallel to the teacher’s parking lot and was lying almost flat to remain unseen. Even then, he was still worried about the tip of the barrel. He had almost an inch creeping out over the ledge of the roof.

But it would have to do, he had no choice.

The car was pulling into the parking lot now; it would only be a few moments until he could be done with this. Parking, opening the door. One more second till his head cleared the roof of the car.

His finger tightened on the trigger as he sighted down the barrel and his breathing slowed, stopped as he held his breath. Always holding the breath in the moments around pulling the trigger. He could almost feel the bullet speeding towards the werewolf’s head and a small smile slid across his face.

And he screamed as a line of fire ripped through his body.

Miles away in a dark hospital room her heart stopped beating and she died.

A bloody knife fell beside his body.

Flat-lined.

 

He came to with someone sprinkling cold water on his face, a silent woman sponging his forehead. Her eyes were angry and her lips thinned against her teeth, almost baring them.

“He’s awake,” she said to someone out of his line of sight.

A blond man stepped along side him and looked down. His eyes glittered blue as Edward stared up impassively.

“You killed our Ulfric, Edward,” he said. “By lukoi law, we are entitled to your blood.”

Edward didn’t answer, he just closed his eyes. He’d failed; he deserved to die for failing her. There was justice in this, he would not hide. Especially not when he had felt her die, felt the pain she’d gone through.

Jason knelt and put himself at eye level with Edward. “I don’t understand. I want to understand before you die. Please,” he said, not hiding the pain and grief in his voice.

Edward opened his eyes again. “What do you want to understand?”

“How could you do this when you know it would kill Anita? That is what I want to understand.”

His jaw clenched. Not anger, but grief. How was he supposed to explain that he’d been trying to save her? And had failed. The grief was terrible, and he tried to console himself before speaking. At least she had died free and not bound to them.

So he summoned anger. “Why don’t you ask around and find out how close to dead she already was? Hard not to be after what they did to her,” he spat bitterly.

Jason’s brow furrowed. “What are you saying?”

Edward knew he wasn’t stupid, but asking him to spell it out in front of other pack members was signing a suicide note. They would rip him apart for slandering their now deceased Ulfric so badly.

He was going to die anyway. Might as well go in style.

“What do you want me to say? That they killed her? She would have died from what they did to her. She was suffering and dying anyway.” He shot a disgusted look at the wolves he could see now as they sidled around the room to see his face.

“They stole her power, they stole her self. They mind raped her so she couldn’t survive. So I took care of it.” A cold, deadly smile slid across his face. “I killed them.”

The silence that followed was deafening. Edward shifted in the chair he was tied to with a slight grimace as blood seeped down his side. No one else moved despite the heavy metallic scent in the air.

“If this is true,” Jason began slowly, “Then you have done us a great service.” He turned to the other pack members. “We must discover the truth of this and see if we have been rid from an Ulfric who would have killed our pack.”

Within minutes they were all gone except Jason. He was untying Edward and letting him slide to the floor as he pressed a piece of cloth to the wound in his side.

“I believe you,” was all Jason said.

Edward nodded and let the wolf staunch the blood flow. He was too tired to even try to think about Anita being dead. It was too painful.

 

It was dark when he opened his eyes. He had fallen asleep and they had left him alone in the dark room. They’d even untied him. Probably Jason’s doing. He was laying on a bed now, his side bandaged where he had been sliced.

There was a sudden crack of light and a shadow gliding across the room towards him. Out of habit he reached under his pillow and groped for the gun that wasn’t there. They’d taken all his weapons; he was helpless.

A lamp clicked on next to the bed and he squinted against the brightness, barely making out Jason’s still figure as his eyes watered. He pinched the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger and willed them to stop watering.

“Did you find your answers?” he bit out against the sudden pain in his side from sitting up so quickly.

Jason watched him silently.

Edward sighed. “Are you going to kill me or not? Because if you are, I’d really rather get it over with.”

The left side of Jason’s mouth quirked a bit, as if he were trying to smile and it took all of his self control to keep from doing it. “You’re not going to die. At least, not here, and not today.”

Jason stooped and picked up two black bags from beside the bed. He sat them on the bed next to Edward. A yellow eyebrow went up. Neither talked as Edward unzipped one and pulled his shoulder holster and Beretta out, sliding them on despite the pain.

Jason held his hand out and Edward could see the plane ticket in it.

“You have almost four hours to make your plane.”

Edward nodded and stood. He only stopped to pull his shoes on, not to change his clothes, before grabbing the second bag, the bag that contained his clothing. He glanced at the other bag, but he left it as he stepped towards the door.

He turned back.

“Did she suffer?” he asked. It had been burning in his mind since he’d killed the wolf and the vampire. He’d been afraid he would be hurting her. But he went through with it so she could die in peace.

Jason looked at him, his eyes bright. “She didn’t suffer. And she’s not suffering now.”

Edward nodded and left.

 

Later, when he was on the plane, he pulled his bag onto his lap. He had a picture of her, he wanted to find it. But when he opened the bag it was gone.

In its place was a small, fluffy penguin. The one Anita had been so fond of. Sigmund.

He buried his face in his hands and cried.

 

Days passed slowly. He took neither the time to grieve nor the time to recuperate. He never returned to St. Louis. Missed her funeral.

He had said his good-byes in her hospital room.

And, for someone who liked being alone, he became a hermit. He stayed in his house in Santa Fe, watching the desert storms through the plate glass in his living room. They were truly amazing if you sat down and watched during the rainy season.

He was silent and fastidious still. He wore the scar he earned from killing the wolf as a badge of honor. It was not the only scar he had gotten doing something good, but there were only two of those compared to his multitude of others.

He wore it as a badge of shame. He should have killed them long before. He should have watched over her more carefully.

This particular evening, he sat watching as the rainwater sluiced down the windows. His Beretta sat next to him, his hand idling caressing it. Wondering if he, this time, would have the guts to pull the trigger.

He was still silently contemplating it as the doorbell rang. He slid the gun into the waistband of his pants and buttoned up the two middling buttons on his shirt before he went to answer it.

He peeked through the peephole and was only rewarded with a flash of white and bright red. An umbrella hid the person from his line of sight, and he opened the door.

The umbrella slipped back behind their head and his eyes widened. His hands began to shake and he felt cold as he stared at Anita, apparently in good health and still… alive. Still alive.

“You have something that belongs to me,” she said softly. She paused. “And I wanted to thank you.”

“You’re alive,” he said. His heart began to beat a little faster, moving up from the almost still pace it had hit when he’d seen her face.

She smiled at him then, the weariness in her eyes abating for a moment. “Yes, I’m still alive. That’s why I wanted to thank you. But can we do this out of the rain, please?”

Within moments she was inside and seated on the couch, a small suitcase at her feet. He glanced from it to her face, the question apparent.

She gave him another small smile. “I don’t really have anywhere to stay. I took a taxi to get here.”

“Bert gave you vacation time?” he asked, shooting her a smile of his own. He took the suitcase and slid it into a room just inside the hall, then sat down.

“You could say that.” She scowled at the face he made. “Well, I did almost die. Again. And it’s going to be a while before I’m… fully recovered, as the doctors put it. Everyone who doesn’t know about the marks thinks I had a break down from being over worked. At least, that’s what Ronnie is saying.”

“As for the rest… they know the truth. That Jean-Claude and Richard,” her face twisted with disgust as she said their names, “tried to kill me and you saved me.”

“I thought you were dead.”

“I know. I’m sorry, Edward. I don’t know why they didn’t tell you.”

He sat back in his chair. “I was sure you were dead. I thought I’d killed you.” He ran a hand through his hair, dragging across his face as if to rub the stress away, pressing his fingers against his eyes to stem the sudden headache.

He heard a rustling and when he opened his eyes she was kneeling at his feet. Smiling at him, alive and knowing, without a doubt that she held his deepest secret.

“If you hadn’t done what you did, Edward, I would be dead. You were the one who told it where to go.”

He held his breath for a moment. Then he leaned over and kissed her, murmuring, “I love you,” against her lips.

 

Darkness fell.

Eventually she slept, curled on her side in his bed, the sheet barely covering her pale body as he slid from under it. He didn’t bother with clothes as he knelt beside the bed, assuming the position he had done so often as a boy.

It was about faith, he supposed.

He’d always had faith in himself, in his own body and abilities. Now it was time to take up the other half of his faith. That half he’d laid to rest so long before when he thought God had betrayed him. Because a good little Catholic boy couldn’t have magic.

But in the end that magic had saved the person he held dearest. Because without it, according to Anita, all of the energy that had been stolen wouldn’t have been directed back at her. It would only have scattered, and she would have died.

“Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee.”

The words slipped from his lips with easy familiarity. They tumbled faster until his whispering was a soft murmur. Right up until the last.

“Pray for us sinners…” He stopped and stared at his hands as they clutched one another in front of him. He’d broken his rosary. He’d always held it when he’d prayed, but now his hands were empty as he looked at them in the darkness. He could almost make out the details of his palms.

But he could make out the detail of the hand that slid over his, fingers slipping through his and holding to them. He looked up to see Anita’s face, a few scant inches from his.

She leaned forward so that her lips brushed his ear, whispering, “Now and at the hour of our death.”

Then she leaned back.

“Edward, come back to bed.”


End file.
